I counter-protested the "March for Life" yesterday. I could not find any information on an organized counter-demonstration, so I grabbed my "Keep Abortion Legal" sign (picked up from last April's March for Women) and took the Metro down to the Mall. Displaying my sign, I walked down to the Washington Monument and into the park adjacent to it's east (?) side. There was not even a pretense of a secular movement- the signs were predominantly religious and the program of speakers was explicitly christian. A park police officer gave me my "first and final warning to leave because [I] don't belong here" so I went down 15th street displaying my sign and searching for other pro-choice activists. I ended up walking along the whole route of a feeder march, going against the tide and receiving jeers from the protesters. I made several sweeps through the downtown area until the formal March began. I followed along, was interviewed by a reporter, and made it to the Supreme Court where I met up with a thin line of pro-choice demonstrators. Quite elated, I jumped over a snow bank onto the sidewalk and proudly held up my sign to the Marchers.

At this point a number of the anti-abortion protestors decided that they were the only ones entitled to First Amendment rights and proceeded to block our signs and faces with theirs. They had the whole street and the opposing sidewalk, yet they couldn't bear to let us have a small section of our own; at one point I was even hit by a snow ball. My complaints that they were acting like fascists were met with shouts of "get a new vocabulary!" despite the fact that this is _exactly_ the type of thing that fascists do when they are not the party in power. They cannot use the apparatus of the state to inflict direct violence and are not content with merely demonstrating in favour of their own views so they go after the opposing side and physically prevent them from being heard.

I engaged a number of the protesters in debate and attempted to explain my position calmly and rationally. The only time I really lost it was when a white guy accused me of being a Nazi and a racist. I flipped out on him and he ran off (to their credit, a number of the anti-abortion protesters yelled at him, too). At first I tried to make the point that, because we live in a multi-religious society with a secular government, the laws that govern us cannot reach into realms (such as when, if at all, ensoulment occurs) that are the proper sphere of religion. I used the example of Islamic law permitting (or requiring) abortion under certain circumstances as an instance of the potential for conflict between religious belief and criminal law. The first gentleman who replied said, "You're wrong. This is not a secular country. The last election proved that." No comment there. The general consensus, expressed by a women standing next to me (this was after the line of counter-protestors was thoroughly broken up) and which totally and sublimely missed the point was that "we don't live under Islamic law; we have separation of Church and State in this country."

After this, I decided to take a different tack and argue from a purely philosophical consideration of the nature of personhood. While concern for the suffering of the foetus is legitimate (as concern for any suffering is), because the foetus does not meet such criteria for personhood as concious self-awareness and a concept of itself as a being persisting overtime with a both a past and a future, these concerns can be overidden in the interests of the mother who is undoubtedly a person and whose needs therefor carry more weight. The main issue in the debate was the inability (or unwillingness) of the anti-abortion activists to see a distinction between life (or human life) and personhood and between the potential to become a person and actually _being_ a person.

Abortion was compared to slavery or the Holocaust as an instance in which persons were denied the their personhood. I responded whereas the objectification of Jews, Africans, and others occured in the face of obvious evidence that they were persons (one wouldn't bother to convert a non-person to one's religion or to ask her for her name and occupation). The situation is quite different with foetus where, for some time there is no brain and thus no seat of conciousness, where, when there is a brain, it's higher centers are not neurologically active till about the six month mark and where, when there is a neurological basis for thought, there is no experential basis for it. Without experiences there can be so sense of self, no memories of the past, and no expectations of the future. There can be no person to wrong. This makes abortion a completely different affair than either of two aforementioned cases.

These issues were still unresolved as it began to snow and the protest broke up. I shook hands with several people, was told that I would be prayed for, had my name written down and my picture taken and proceeded to South Capitol Metro and, from there, home. I did recieve enouragement from many of the passers by (a representative from the New Statehood Movement in Puerto Rico particularly stuck in mind) and that made me feel as if my efforts were worth it.

What struck me most about the March was how much it demonstrated that there is no coherent "pro-life" movement. There is definately an anti-abortion movement, but it remains divided along religious lines (Catholics vs. Orthodox vs. Protestants vs. secular Conservatives) and ideologically; there is no coherent position on other 'life' issues such as euthanasia, the death penalty, war, health care (the fault line between Catholics and Protestants on the last three issues and between secular and religious conservatives on the first is particularly pronounced). The opposite is true of the pro-choice movement. There is broad consensus not only that abortion should remain legal, safe, viable alternative but that family planning (including the use of contraceptives) is a virtue, that providing health care to women and children is a worthwile goal for society, and that women should be empowere politically, economically, socially and culturally. It is my hope that our consensus around a whole constellation of issues will give our movement the strength it needs to outlast its opponents.